


Out of Hand

by Mina Lightstar (ukefied)



Category: How I Met Your Mother
Genre: Alcohol, M/M, poor decisions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-21
Updated: 2011-10-21
Packaged: 2017-10-24 20:11:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/267400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ukefied/pseuds/Mina%20Lightstar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The part of the story Ted doesn’t tell his kids.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Out of Hand

**Author's Note:**

> For Lily/measuringlife. Also, to explain the gross OOC stupidity that was “Twin Beds.” Should fit in quite nicely between scenes? Thanks to zooksies for the beta.

If they’d been less drunk, they might have talked each other out of doing anything remotely stupid. They might have realized that what they were really upset about involved chasing the ghost of the ideal woman (Ted) and struggling with deep-seated abandonment issues (Barney.) Ted would have had an epiphany: he didn’t _really_ want Robin back; he was afraid of losing his best friend to a relationship while he floundered, loveless — envisioning Robin as the personification of everything he wanted but couldn’t seem to find. He didn’t want Robin, but the spectre of what his relationship with her had come to mean: security, loyalty, _home._ Take away Robin, and Ted was back where he started, nowhere close to finding Miss Right. Once he understood all that, he might have let well enough alone. Knowledge is half the battle, so they said. And Barney … well, once Ted had explained this line of reasoning, Barney would have sobered up, gotten bored, and realized he was surrounded by boobs.

If they’d been _more_ drunk, they wouldn’t have talked about anything. They would have watched _Field of Dreams_ , cried a little, gone to sleep on the couch smelling like whiskey, and woken up in a tangled mess. Most importantly, they would have been too hammered to get it up.

Unfortunately, they were _perfectly_ drunk for everything wrong to happen.

***

Ted’s apartment is a mess. He surveys the wreckage, feeling like a wounded soldier. The right side of his face still stings and feels puffy. The ice-pack hasn’t done much good, but with any luck maybe he won’t be half-blind tomorrow. His only consolation is that he managed to elbow Barney in the nose.

He doesn’t know how he’s going to clean this up before Robin comes home. Ted doesn’t even remember how they managed to trash the place. … Did he seriously call Robin to tell her she had pretty hair?

“Ted,” Barney stumbles out of the bathroom, once again dressed to the nines but lacking the _poise_ one should possess when wearing four-figure suits. He raises a finger, an _issue_. “Ted. Ted. Ted.”

Ted waits. Barney thinks about it.

“ _Ted,_ ” he says again.

“ _What?_ ”

“We’re going about this all wrong,” Barney declares, finally pointing the finger, issue now on the table.

Ted feels fuzzy all over, and he moves back to the couch with drunken detachment. “Your nose is still bleeding.”

“ _Your_ nose is bleeding,” the blond retorts sullenly. He grabs another tissue and wipes, confirming the claim with mild horror. “My nose is bleeding!”

“What are we doing wrong?” Ted asks, gazing at the mess of empty bottles and ice cream containers. “I miss you, Cherry Garcia.”

“I miss Cherry Garcia, too,” Barney agrees, mournful. “He always knew exactly what to say. I stole his girlfriend once, but he was cool with it. True story.”

Ted reaches out, blindly, and finds a fistful of Barney’s slacks. “ _What_ are we doing _wrong?_ ” he asks again.

“What are we doing wrong?” Barney wonders, face scrunching up in confusion.

“No, _you_ said — ugh, never mind. You’re drunk.”

“ _You’re_ drunk,” Barney shoots back, and then trips over Ted’s legs. “You know what I hate?” This is muffled by the carpet.

“Balance?”

“Ha, ha. This just in: Ted Mosby dodges dumb ‘falling for me’ joke with _even dumber joke_.” He drags himself onto the couch. “No, I hate Don. He thinks he’s so fucking special. He barely even wears pants.”

“He totally hates pants,” Ted agrees. He turns to look at Barney; his head moves first, but his vision kind of swims along leisurely after. “Anyone who dates Robin should love pants. Also, he thought I was gay, which is just. You know. Why would anyone?”

“Fabulous cowboy boots!” Barney crows, hand raised for a high-five.

“You suck,” Ted tells him, because Barney totally does.

The hand stays where it is, suspended in mid-air, awaiting acknowledgement.

“Anyway, I bet Don has some stupid shoes to go with his stupid hair and stupid face.” Ted purses his lips, thinking about sushi and fine wine and, _Damn it, Robin._

“ _Dude._ ”

Ted glances askance at his friend. Barney’s still waiting, quirking one eyebrow. Ted sighs and high-fives him so they can get on with their lives. “What is it about Robin that makes us idiots?” he goes on. He sinks into the couch and Barney slumps next to him. “We’re two perfectly reasonable—” he looks down at the blond playing his with his tie “—one perfectly reasonable man, and look what we’ve done over an ex-girlfriend.”

“I thought I liked Don, maybe,” Barney says. He’s a heavy, warm weight pressed against Ted’s side. “But I don’t. He’s moving in on our thing so seamlessly, I can’t stand it.”

“Our thing?” Maybe Barney’s too warm. Or Ted’s too warm. Either way, it’s too hot in here now. He picks at his shirt, brushes his pants — wants to occupy his hands.

“You, me, and Robin. We’re like, a thing.”

“We are totally a giant, convoluted _thing_ ,” Ted agrees, and he almost sort of gets it all — but then it’s gone just as quickly, because he’s drunk and realizing that not all of the hands on him are his own. “What—?”

Barney Stinson’s mouth is his greatest weapon. Ted knows this; he’s seen it in action, spinning lie after bald-faced lie, charming woman after woman. Barney’s _lips_ , on the other hand, are his saving throw. They are so goddamned soft, Ted will claim from here on out that if Barney kisses you, it is _over._ So Ted kisses back, because what the hell. Barney crumples Ted’s shirt in his fists; he tastes like whiskey and faint traces of smoke. Ted shifts around, trying to take charge of the kiss, and it starts as a struggle not too unlike the previous round in the kitchen. The embrace gets rough, both of them accustomed to an eventually pliant partner and neither willing to give in.

Ted figures, why sugarcoat it? He surges out of the cushions and into Barney, pulling at the blond’s tie and trying to shove his jacket off at the same time. He ends up immobilizing his friend’s arms and grinning to himself — nearly shouting “King of the mountain!” before he hears Barney’s protests.

“Whoa, whoa, _whoa,_ cowboy!” Barney draws back, flushed and breathless and eyes a little wild. Ted thinks he’s gone too far — but _Barney_ fucking started it, and they’re drunk, and his pants are a bit tight, and they’re _drunk_. Barney starts fussing with his jacket and Ted winces, ‘cause Barney is stronger than he looks and throws a mean right-hook.

But all Barney does is shrug carefully out of the jacket and tie on his own, giving Ted an exasperated look. “This is _Versace_ , you douche.”

Ted rolls his eyes and bats the pieces out of his friend’s hand, not caring where they fall. “Then take it _off._ Jesus,” he adds, and goes in for the kill. Barney is stronger, but Ted remembers he’s also drunker, pushing him into the cushions with relative ease — fighting with the buttons on the crisp white shirt and doing something clumsy and probably not so great to his ear.

“Ted,” Barney chokes out, rolling his hips up.

The friction is electric. Ted pushes up onto his hands, surprised at how good it feels. The movement just pushes his pelvis harder against Barney’s, and for a very long moment Ted’s sole purpose in life is to _never stop doing that._ It’s mind-blowing, and pants need to be disappearing post-haste. Barney’s clothing-preservation activism doesn’t extend beyond his own; he gets rid of Ted’s shirt so fast, he hears the stitching stretch.

“Dude!” Ted protests, faintly.

“It was cheap.” He doesn’t even have the grace to look a little contrite, already going for Ted’s belt. “Trust me, you’re better off.”

He is better off, Ted realizes — better off without _pants._ God, Don’s right: pants suck. He gets to work on Barney’s. Belts are far more complex when one is totally wasted. He pulls, and pushes, and twists — twists too hard, because Barney yelps, mutters something nasty, and does it himself.

“I love you,” Ted declares, and it’s very true, because now there are no more pants and the world is a better place.

Barney mumbles something else, but Ted doesn’t catch it. He’s too busy making sure every inch of their skin is touching. Their erections slide together — white-hot pleasure, encroaching on the drink-addled fuzz of Ted’s mind. He groans into Barney’s shoulder, and thinks he hears the blond moan, too. Belatedly, he hopes Barney’s wallet is within reach. He doesn’t want to hold up production retreating to his room for a condom. Barney always has condoms.

 _Wait, condoms?_ Ted blinks, experiencing a moment of clarity. He looks down at Barney — eyes half-lidded, chest glistening from either sweat or Ted’s tongue, he can’t tell anymore. “Uh,” Ted pants, wondering how he looks, “condom?” How romantic. _Why sugarcoat it?_

Barney stares at him for a moment, reaches up and rolls one of Ted’s nipples between his fingers. “Sure.”

It’s as simple as that. Ted gropes around for Barney’s pants. The blond, meanwhile, slides a hand between their bodies and touches them both with a firm, practiced grip. Ted produces the wallet and, though loath to break contact, sits up astride Barney’s waist and fishes for a condom. He finds some in the middle of a bunch of fake business cards, rips it open with his teeth and pulls Barney off the couch.

“God, bossy much?”

Ted doesn’t answer, searching between the cushions for lube. Between years of Marshall, Lily, and Robin, there is lube all over this place. He finds a tube stashed away with some massage oil. This will prompt questions when he’s sober, but for now all he cares about is how Barney’s hot to the touch and the lube is cool wetness slicked on his fingers and—

“Ow! What the _hell_ , Theodore?”

“Sorry! I’ve never done this before.”

“ _Obviously._ ”

“Oh, come on.” Ted scrambles, trying again, his other hand reaching around to apologize. Barney’s cock is hotter than the rest of him; Ted’s twitches.

“You suck at being gay, I can’t believe anyone ever thought you were.” Even as he complains, Barney is moving in time with Ted’s ministrations, fingers struggling to find faint purchase on the sofa cushions.

“‘M not that bad,” Ted insists, and proceeds to prove it.

He’s not thinking about Robin anymore. He’s wrapped around Barney, or maybe Barney’s wrapped around him, and it isn’t gentle and there is no finesse and this — _this_ — has almost-happened a dozen times before, so why did it suddenly actually happen? He doesn’t have the answer now, drunk on drink and pleasure and the knowledge that Barney likes ear-nibbling.

He doesn’t have the answer afterward, lying on the floor with his head pillowed in Barney’s lap, surrounded by wadded tissues and a used condom. Barney’s sitting against the couch, arms outstretched upon the cushions and his head tipped back.

“Holy shit,” he pants.

“Yeeaah,” Ted concurs. He sits up and slides a few inches over, because it’s starting to get weird. “Uh…” he doesn’t know what to say, if he should say anything. There must be a Rule about this somewhere. He’s still drunk — god, he’s never wanted so badly to not be drunk so he can _think._

Barney’s already getting dressed. Figures; he doesn’t stick around for _normal_ one-night stands.

Ted tries to reason with him. “Hey, listen — about this—”

“I want Robin back,” Barney overrides him, with the same fervor as earlier in the evening. And a little too quickly.

But Ted wants the buffer back, too. It’s too … it’s just…. “I deserve her more.”

“I’m going home,” Barney says, but he’s clearly lying. He doesn’t slam the door on the way out, but it feels like he does.

Ted gets dressed and disposes of the evidence before tailing him.


End file.
